Heald, Hurwitz, and Schlossberg are done playing in this world for the time being, but Macchio dove back in shortly after Coba Kai wrapped when he shot the movie Karate Kid: Legends with Jackie Chan and newcomer Ben Wang. It ties together the original four Karate Kidmovies with the 2010 remake, which stared Chan as the Miyagi-like Mr. Han and Jaden Smith as his young protégé. According to conventional Karate Kidwisdom, the Miyagi-verse and the Han-verse were separate realms, so “connecting the worlds was the challenge,” Macchio says, but the filmmakers came up with a solution.
“They figured out a way to do that that is organic to a scene in Karate Kid 2 that people on the internet are starting to figure out,” Macchio says, “which explains that karate comes from kung fu, which is the truth.”
The movie picks up a couple of years after the events of Cobra Kai, and involves LaRusso training another young student alongside Mr. Han. “This is a different version of Daniel,” says Macchio. “He’s more at peace with his life, and more Miyagi, in a way.”
The Cobra Kai creative team had nothing to do with the movie, and didn’t even learn it was happening until they were gearing up to create Season Six of their show. “Our main contribution was just making sure that there were no contradictions and that one thing wasn’t going to negatively affect the other,” says Schlossberg. “We read a draft of the script and gave our thoughts.”
They also met with director Jonathan Entwistle. “He’s a great guy and big fan of Cobra Kai,” says Hurwitz. “It’s interesting, because it’s not really a continuation of Cobra Kai per se. It’s a new Karate Kidstory. And Daniel LaRusso plays a role in that story, so all that needed to happen was that the Daniel LaRusso who appeared in that movie made sense as the Daniel LaRusso that we left Cobra Kaiwith.”
Do any Cobra Kai characters appear in the movie? “Maybe yes, maybe no,” says a tight-lipped Macchio. “I don’t know. I don’t have an answer for that.”
